Flying Officer Ron Gray lost contact with his Sabre formation in haze and attempted to return to Jever. Because of a low fuel state (due to a hostile homing signal), he was diverted to Hamburg but had to force-land on an autobahn 8 miles east of Hamburg.
Here is the story from Ron's point of view: "In the autobahn incident; the dive brakes had not fully retracted and hence I was losing ground on the rest of the formation. The weather was very hazy and there was no sight of the ground. My fault not to follow standing orders and get a 10 minute fix, we were newly fangled with the 'radio compass' and I had it tuned to Jever frequency. At that time the NDB did not give morse-code identification and the crafty sods over the border had one of the same frequency; although I was not aware at the time. I had gone higher than the other three to look down for them and it was later established that a jet stream (what the hell are they?!) had been belting eastwards. Doug Bridson suggested I fly at best economical cruise. Fixer service would not fix, just steer 270° so can you image the cruising speed I adopted when the penny dropped!"
Ron's escapade featured strongly in the German press at the time. He had a collection of German articles and cartoons about his landing on the Autobahn, some of which are attached below. It was planned to refuel his Sabre and fly it off, taking off under a bridge to gather speed. Unfortunately there was a dent in the leading edge of the starboard wing which made things potentially dodgy. He had hit a sapling when taxying to one side of the carriageway after landing. Ken Senar, Flying Wing Adjutant at the time, thinks Leo Cowan was present and in charge of the aircraft being dismantled.
[
Click to see report in 4 Sqn F540 Operations Record Book.]
Translation of the above German Newspaper Report:
As an Eye-witness Saw It:
At 11.8 kilometres the Machine Came Down in an Emergency
Landing
____________________________________________
(Continued from page 1)
We talked to Road-attendant Maurice, the man who
yesterday afternoon witnessed the crash-landing
of the British jet-plane from the first engine-failure
to the arrival of the rescue team.
____________________________________________
Maurice was just supervising the road-works at the 11.8 Km mark. Sharply and unusually slowly the jet plane came down from the Hamburg direction. Suddenly the machine began to shudder. "Now there'll be an accident" said Maurice to the workmen. "This has got the lot - air disaster and Autobahn disaster!" The men took full cover.
But the pilot was in control of the situation, with an elegant left curve he glided over the autobahn fly-over between Stellau and Stapelfeld and put down on the road 250 metres further on in the Hamburg direction. Apparently a damage-free landing.
Suddenly the pilot felt a jerk. The right wing had cut a 30 centimetre thick oak tree clean off. So the machine skidded into the side and tore up a strip and several markers until it skidded off the carriage way and jumped into a cornfield. The speed was in any case so slow by now that the plane could not bore any further into the sand and after a quarter-turn, lay still with its nose two metres from the Autobahn.
Then soon there came 3 other jet planes. The pilots were glad to see their comrade standing by the cockpit waving. So he had come out of it alive.
German police and military police immediately took all measurements in order to keep the Autobahn traffic moving
Jet Fighter Makes Emergency Landing in the Middle of the
Hamburg Autobahn
A bold flight over the bridges
Panic gripped the drivers on the Hamburg-Lübeck Autobahn at 4.30 pm yesterday. 2 kilometres outside Hamburg city boundary a British Jet Fighter suddenly made an emergency landing on the road, skidded 400 metres straight along and landed up in a cornfield severely damaged.
The lusty young pilot came with his aircraft from Jever (Lower Saxony) and was on the way to Hamburg. Suddenly the engine failed. Fortunately the petrol tank was empty. In the final seconds the R.A.F. pilot succeeded in landing right on the road after flying over the Autobahn bridge.
The pilot climbed out of the cockpit unhurt and gave emergency signals to three British planes who had started out from Jever with him and who were searching for the suddenly damaged plane. The military police, the German police and the fire service were immediately given the alarm by radio.
The pilot of an RAF jet fighter chose the national Hamburg-Lübeck Autobahn as emergency landing-ground.
Yesterday on the Autobahn: Jet plane on foot.
A fantastic emergency landing, which fortunately worked out well, was "engineered" yesterday by the 20 year old pilot of a British Sabre jet. Since the radio compass of his machine was lying, the young air-warrior had, as they say in flying parlance "got lost". Suddenly his fuel had run out. The howling turbine was silenced. At the 10 kilometre stone on the Hamburg-Lübeck Autobahn, near Stapelfeld, the machine came down to land. Two car drivers, who the pilot flew over by this manoeuvre at very low altitude, ducked their heads as the whistling silver bird suddenly came upon them so threateningly. But then their mouths fell open in amazement - the machine came down on the turf strip, then slid onto the carriage way and rolled - even in the right direction! - another 400 metres further, only to be turned to the right into a corn-field as it caught a 30 centimetre thick oak tree with its right wingtip. Alarm for the British and German police! The emergency landing ground was cordoned off and English military police watched eagerly over the wounded bird. - Our pictures show the slewed skid mark of the jet planes undercarriage leading into the corn-field. The arrow points to the machine. In the picture above is the emergency-landed jet plane and to its right in the leather (combinations!) flying suit - the pilot.
One piece from
XB940 that
Ron rescued from the damaged leading edge that sawed off the tree. The top has part of the roundel
showing in blue and the bottom photo is a view of the reverse side.
A friendly missive from one of Ron's Dutch fans.
Finally an entry in the
4 Sqn line-book.
